The store was closed, the listing became a mess overnight...the seller was pranked by the service provider?

As more and more people enter the Amazon market, the competition becomes increasingly fierce and a series of industry chaos has also occurred. While sellers need to avoid the "open attacks" of various platform rules, they must also beware of the "hidden attacks" of competitors.

The store was closed and the listing went down in smoke overnight... Is this an unscrupulous service provider's doing?

Recently, a seller reported in a forum that someone maliciously placed an order in his store and threatened to ask for a refund. After he refused the other party's request, his store was closed ...

In the post, the seller said that he was running a Japanese website and had recently launched a product with a relatively high unit price. Ten days before the incident, his store received dozens of orders in one day. Since the product was a professional product with a small market, there were only two orders before that, which naturally aroused the seller's vigilance.

The seller said that he had opened a case to report the suspicious order and removed the product on the same day, and hoped that the customer service would cancel the order. However, the customer service said that they did not have the authority and suggested that the seller contact the buyer on the website to cancel the order after the order was shipped , which the seller did.

The next day, a Japanese WeChat account added the seller, claiming to be responsible for the incident, and gave 19 orders, saying they were placed by them, and asked the seller to return the money. After being rejected by the seller, the other party showed the seller a screenshot of the submitted one-star review and a fake seller's review transfer record , claiming that it could shut down the seller's store.

A week later, the seller received a closure email, which stated: In accordance with Section 3 of Amazon's Business Solutions Agreement, your Amazon seller account has been deactivated... The information we obtained indicates that this account has abused Amazon's services by issuing refunds or payments without sufficient reason.

Subsequently, the seller’s backend showed that it was unable to log in, and when logging into the account, it kept showing that the password was wrong.

In the comments of the post, some sellers said, "This is blatant extortion!" Others believed that this was most likely done by an unscrupulous service provider hired by a competitor.

A seller made a suggestion: Violation of Article 3 of the Business Solutions Agreement is equivalent to fraud, which is a very serious problem . In actual situations, there are very few cases of mistaken blocking. Since the seller was spoofed, it is recommended that the seller file a complaint and submit relevant evidence.

In the comments, many sellers claimed that they had similar experiences, even more than once. Most sellers suggested that if you encounter this situation, don't add WeChat, don't refund , just ignore them, these people have no other way to get rid of the store except to give bad reviews.

Industry chaos is indeed endless. In addition to the above sellers, it is not uncommon for service providers to charge for helping to spoof competitors' listings. Recently, similar incidents have occurred frequently around some sellers. The saying that " 300 yuan can destroy the opponent's link " is even circulating in the industry, which makes many sellers shudder...

"The industry is in such a mess recently. You can get other people's links for only 300 yuan. How much effort and hard work others put in, and how many days and nights they have to endure, can be destroyed overnight by unscrupulous service providers." A seller lamented that the phenomenon of turning three listings into shit in one night is just the tip of the iceberg in the industry. As Chinese sellers, why should we hurt each other?

It is understood that some unscrupulous service providers attract more customers by vigorously promoting their low prices and professionalism. 300 yuan can ruin the other party's listing, but the process of appeal and reply is difficult and long. For the sellers who are spoofed, the losses and expenses caused are unwarranted disasters.

At present, a large number of sellers believe that this phenomenon in the industry should not be allowed to continue. One seller said: "The industry is constantly changing, and it is not easy to enter this circle. No matter what the reason, the operations of some unscrupulous service providers are really hateful!"

At the same time, some sellers believe that the operations of a small number of unscrupulous service providers are based on the needs of some sellers. The reason why unscrupulous service providers can continue to exist in the industry shows that these businesses have a market. Ultimately, the problem lies with some sellers. If sellers do not have any crooked intentions, unscrupulous service providers will naturally not make money.

As more and more sellers enter the market , the competition among homogeneous products on Amazon becomes more and more fierce. When sellers are unable to resist powerful opponents, they will turn their attention to other places and begin to rely on these "external forces". Therefore, in the eyes of some sellers, finding service providers and using spoof methods are more for self-protection and counterattack.

In fact, it’s not just spoofing competitors’ listings. In the industry, there are also some “operations” that are happening between sellers that hurt each other…

Celebrity account hacked! Service provider once again performs tricky operation

Amid the Amazon account suspension earthquake, many sellers had their accounts blocked due to fake orders, reviews, and black technology. Nowadays, sellers are more cautious about account security issues. They no longer use "black technology" and instead focus more on compliant operations. However, the reality is that sellers are not necessarily safe outside the site.

Recently, an off-site celebrity posted a message on a social networking site asking for help, saying that his Amazon buyer account was hacked because he opened an anonymous email from an off-site service provider and clicked on the short link in it .

According to the sellers, some off-site service providers have already extended their black hands to off-site celebrities. They will use the gimmick of low price and high quality to collect off-site promotion orders, and will also use phishing links, disguise them as short links and mix them into off-site promotion orders. As long as the celebrity clicks on the link, he will be phished, his account will be stolen, and his account will be stolen.

Many sellers were shocked by the fact that the service provider not only earned money from the sellers, but also hacked the influencer accounts. More importantly, many influencers have reported the incident to Amazon.

Some sellers speculate that normally, service providers and influencers maintain long-term cooperative relationships, and the hacking of influencer accounts may not be large-scale. It is very likely that they just want to target a certain influencer, so they deliberately mix phishing links into emails. For sellers, if they are associated with these influencer accounts, their accounts and links may be at great risk.

“In the end, the only ones who suffer are the sellers. The influencers can increase the prices or choose not to do it, but this will have a huge impact on the sellers,” said a seller.

As things stand, this service provider’s approach ultimately has the greatest impact on sellers, and it also serves as a warning to many people: this unorthodox approach can bring temporary benefits, but it will also bring risks to oneself and damage the reputation and environment of the entire industry. It is not the right path after all. If you want to go long-term in the industry, you still have to honestly choose a formal and legal way of competition.

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